OK. Seriously. I hate summer. When you say it gets too freaking hot
in the summer, people say "Hey, don't complain. You'll WISH it was this hot when winter rolls around!"
This isn't true in my case though. I love winter. I'll walk around outside in a T-shirt in the snow.
Anyway though, the bottom line is that my brain was so cooked this week that more or less passed out for
a few days and came to thinking it was Thursday. Fortunately though, the heat's dying down today, the
DNS whackiness that kept a lot of people from seeing the site yesterday, and it's time for a column!

Yesterday, you said it was hot. Too hot to think. And I believe you, for a devil just poked my ass. But tell me, my androgynous ectoplasm columnist of DOOM, what exactly happens to slimes when they get too hot? Please do not be offended by my ignorance. I simply wish to understand my fellow sentient being and Mac addict. Do slimes dry and shrivel up? Do they get all boily and bubbly and evaporate? Or do they simply disappear much like the Goo King of BoF series? Your response is much appreciated.

Secret Asian Man

Googleshng:
When a slime gets so hot it dies, it flashes a couple times and disappears, leaving behind 1 GP. The same
happens if a slime is drowned, stabbed, stepped on, poked with a stick, tripped over, frozen, left outside
in a storm, or sneezed on. For most varieties at least.

So...I'm here and I'm thinking...how do websites show
up on search engines without any permission? a
friend's website (winkwinknudgenudge) just came
up...and this is confusing. how did they find him? are
people stalking him? AAH! No!

Googleshng:
Well, you know, web pages are inherently available for public viewing, and thus show up on search engines.

Moving on the RPG related questions:
1. If I told you I found a yummie Star Ocean 2 OST
would you be jealous?

Googleshng:
No I wouldn't.

2. How do you feel about the lack of characterization
in some games? Do you think (aside from other
improvments some games could make) the problem has
been unintersting characters or just some characters
ended up as being vague and not even understood?

Thank you for your time.
Starsickle- DEFUNCT Webmaster.

Googleshng:
Most RPGs today focus on the main character and his girlfriend, surrounding them with a bunch of one-dimensional
characters, at least one of which is actually more interesting than the characters who get developed.
Of course, since the main concept of an RPG is to give you complete control over one character in an
emersive world while spending most of your time hacking through dungeons, so underdeveloped characters
shouldn't be that big of a concern.

Eep!

Hey Goog!

I was talking with a friend of mine who's interested in getting into RPGs and wanted my suggestion of the best current system to buy as well as the best 5 RPGs to play, so that he could see a very broad example of how different RPGs can be. I was having a hard time coming up with an answer so I figured you might add something to my thinking.

Zachary 'ASV' Lewis

Googleshng:
Hmm, this is a tough little ball of inquiry without any simple answers. So allow me to just babble incoherently
for a while.

The system getting the most RPG releases today is, believe it or not, the Game Boy Advance.

The system with the widest variety of RPGs which vary from the norm is the Sega Saturn, of course it comes
with the catch that said games are all very hard to find.

Of course, there's also the PSX, which has an impressive number of easy to find, standard issue RPGs,
plus it's cheap.

Sam, quit walking into the trees... hey! HEY!

Dear Sir,

You may or may not know, but many years ago there was a game called Lord of the Rings for the SNES. It was, I beleive, the first video game based on the famous Tolkien literature. It was also, I believe, the first RPG (action in this case) to do away with saving games and instead use passwords. Needless to say, that alone made the game terrible, although it was interesting when I once (apparently) entered the wrong password and found Gandalf and Gimli in my party. And I hadn't even left Hobbiton! Yes, the game had it's faults. But it also had some of the nicest music I've heard in a videogame. It gave a nice medievel, celtic feel for the game.

I have tried contacting Interplay, the guilty parties responsible for the game, but they were no help. Please, even if it is only in electronic format, could you help me find music from this game? I realize that the game is old and little-known. I don't want to have to download the ROM and endure any unnecessary pain.

Thank you,
Matt

Googleshng:
That horrible horrible attrocity was not the first RPG ever released with passwords instead of battery,
but it's one of only a few SNES games to lack that most basic of features. Anyway though, I'm pretty sure
no soundtrack was ever released, and I've never seen music from it elsewhere, but there's a few sites out
there which throw music files from games around willy-nilly, so you might have some luck on search engines.

Save [princess] from [badguy]!

I have a question about Threads Of Fate. Was it previsously titled "Dew Prism" because that's what the "[Relic]" was called in the japanese verison? If that's the case, why would they choose to rename it "relic"? That seems rather stupid. Also, will there ever be a sequal? The first one was really fun and didn't get nearly enough credit. Thanks for letting me waste your time.

Salldark

Googleshng:
Threads of Fate was called Dew Prism in Japan while it was in development. Evidently, the localization
team really couldn't stand that name though, and couldn't think of anything better, so we get [relic].
Oh, and no word on a sequel to my knowledge.

Filler

Greetings (Chibi-Chesh sings) GOOGLESHNG
I know you're an expert on odd things so I have a problem. How do you
stop a horrible toothache since a wisdom tooth is coming in and the pain is
almost constant. Also I want people to know to send me mail since I'm doing a
Q&A session on my website.
Imperial Mog

Googleshng:
Well, you can go to a dentist, but they tend to yank wisdom teeth out. As for getting questions from
people, you'd probably have better luck if you plastered your e0mail address all over, wouldn't you?

Quickies

What is the subtitle for LUNAR 3

"Lunar 3: Game Which Does Not Exist COMPLETE"

It was put to me that you might be thinking of Lunar Legends, which is not a third Lunar game, but a GBA
remake of the original, and has no little subtitle.

Googlething are you asexual?

Uh... yeah, sure, whatever.

That was really disturbed. Keep it up.

I really need some way of differenciating column mail and feedback from rants I post, but thanks.

The Last Laugh:

Tada, column be up!

Now, on a totally unrelated note, I don't suppose anyone out there happens to have a nice copy of Blood
Bowl they'd be willing to part with? It's darn hard to find that sucker anywhere.